Caterham 160 the dinky one - who's built/run/bought one
Discussion
Thought I'd ask in general gassing first, so who has bought, built or is driving the new model Caterham 160 aka the Dinky Toy one with the Suzuki engine?
I have owned & or driven pretty much every variant of car you can possibly imagine. Quite frankly I'm bored of most of them often for a specific reason. I quite like a build project & one of these Dinky Toy &'s rather fits the bill.
There is also a historical family reason for wanting to build one. My late dad built one of the first Austin Seven Specials that later became & developed into the Seven as we now know them. I'd love to build a "New Austin Seven Special" but not sure it would be practical to do so & I hate rust or bolts I don't have the right size metric spanner for
I have driven many a fast Caterham in anger, in fact spent far too long working in them, fast ones I found a bit too fast for the road If I'm honest, great on track though. Don't want a fast one I know that for sure.
So do tell your experiences, are values holding up? did you build it yourself? is it more fun than that first date at 15?
As an example last year I did 9k miles in the new MX-5 90% of it with the roof down, loved it, but I can't build one myself. Last month spent some time drooling over several Seven Specials but don't really do vintage if I'm honest. My Daily driver to work for the past two years has 64bhp, its more "fun to drive" than the 564bhp I frequently jump into at work.
Yes I know I'm an odd customer !
I have owned & or driven pretty much every variant of car you can possibly imagine. Quite frankly I'm bored of most of them often for a specific reason. I quite like a build project & one of these Dinky Toy &'s rather fits the bill.
There is also a historical family reason for wanting to build one. My late dad built one of the first Austin Seven Specials that later became & developed into the Seven as we now know them. I'd love to build a "New Austin Seven Special" but not sure it would be practical to do so & I hate rust or bolts I don't have the right size metric spanner for
I have driven many a fast Caterham in anger, in fact spent far too long working in them, fast ones I found a bit too fast for the road If I'm honest, great on track though. Don't want a fast one I know that for sure.
So do tell your experiences, are values holding up? did you build it yourself? is it more fun than that first date at 15?
As an example last year I did 9k miles in the new MX-5 90% of it with the roof down, loved it, but I can't build one myself. Last month spent some time drooling over several Seven Specials but don't really do vintage if I'm honest. My Daily driver to work for the past two years has 64bhp, its more "fun to drive" than the 564bhp I frequently jump into at work.
Yes I know I'm an odd customer !
I remember reading a couple of detailed accounts of owning 160s in the Caterham sub forum, so as above- go and have a look in there.
Personally I have my reservations about a Caterham with a turbocharged engine and the tyre sizes on the 160 are a bit fussy too... I owned an old 1.6 Vauxhall engined car which had the same basic, low-powered appeal and looked great on it's 13x5.5j Weller steel wheels and loved it. The old crossflows are good (the Vauxhalls and crossflows have carburettors sticking out of the bonnet for extra charm) and maybe the best gem amongst the slow Caterhams is the 1.4 k-series which gives a keen, revvy 100bhp and is the only one of these to have the superior de-dion rear suspension.
Obviously none of these can be bought new now but Caterhams are equally fun to restore- you can send the chassis back to Arch motors and it will come back looking brand new and ready for a livery of your choice.
Personally I have my reservations about a Caterham with a turbocharged engine and the tyre sizes on the 160 are a bit fussy too... I owned an old 1.6 Vauxhall engined car which had the same basic, low-powered appeal and looked great on it's 13x5.5j Weller steel wheels and loved it. The old crossflows are good (the Vauxhalls and crossflows have carburettors sticking out of the bonnet for extra charm) and maybe the best gem amongst the slow Caterhams is the 1.4 k-series which gives a keen, revvy 100bhp and is the only one of these to have the superior de-dion rear suspension.
Obviously none of these can be bought new now but Caterhams are equally fun to restore- you can send the chassis back to Arch motors and it will come back looking brand new and ready for a livery of your choice.
Edited by HustleRussell on Monday 2nd May 09:59
Vitorio said:
cptsideways said:
As an example last year I did 9k miles in the new MX-5 90% of it with the roof down, loved it, but I can't build one myself.
This might not fit with the hate of rust and seized bolts, but old mx-5 + supercharger/turbo-kit and a Mev-exocet kit?
t except to point out the hideous engineering flaws in the chassis if you can even call it a chassis. Old yes, flawed engineering no.cptsideways said:
Been there & done that, had a few MX-5's & built a turbo'd one 10 years ago before all the rage. You will not get me anywhere near a MEV Heapofst except to point out the hideous engineering flaws in the chassis if you can even call it a chassis. Old yes, flawed engineering no.
So its not just me that thinks the chassis design is totally flawed. The KitCar forum seem to rave about it. t except to point out the hideous engineering flaws in the chassis if you can even call it a chassis. Old yes, flawed engineering no.
CanAm said:
cptsideways said:
Been there & done that, had a few MX-5's & built a turbo'd one 10 years ago before all the rage. You will not get me anywhere near a MEV Heapofst except to point out the hideous engineering flaws in the chassis if you can even call it a chassis. Old yes, flawed engineering no.
So its not just me that thinks the chassis design is totally flawed. The KitCar forum seem to rave about it. t except to point out the hideous engineering flaws in the chassis if you can even call it a chassis. Old yes, flawed engineering no.
GOG440 said:
...is wheel really attached with a couple of set screws?
Yeah, but don't worry: since the wheel itself is from a Suzuki Burgman scooter (and so not designed to take any lateral load), the wheel will probably collapse long before the Rose joint falls off.But he sells hundreds of cars and, as CanAm says, there are a bunch of sycophants on the Kit Car forum who would have you believe that the sun shines out of his backside. But then look at how long Robin Hood lasted and how many
Troubleatmill said:
Surely - that is not factory built is it?
It certainly seems to be. You can see the same arrangement on the gallery on the company's own website. if you look closely.downsman said:
My god, that is scary. How the hell did that get through IVA?
Cause its not designed to be through an iva. Oh and the eco exo is not made by stuart anymore.Well considering the total sales of the exocet is getting on close to a thousand sold if not more (mine was number 200+ something when I bought mine in 2012) throughout the world including Australia which is tough to do It cant be all that bad now can it.
The kit is not built to be a chassis the strength of the kit is in the way its mounted to the running gear which is connected front and back through the ppf design of the mx5. Also as it uses everything from the mx5 donor its a very cost effective and affordable kit to build. The quoted build cost is way off though 6k including iva seems to be the norm. But what kit desgined to go through iva is at that sort of price range.
They have proved to be extremely competitive in racing aswell and mx5 under pinnings are extremely useful for performance upgrades too.
MG CHRIS said:
Cause its not designed to be through an iva. Oh and the eco exo is not made by stuart anymore.
Well considering the total sales of the exocet is getting on close to a thousand sold if not more (mine was number 200+ something when I bought mine in 2012) throughout the world including Australia which is tough to do It cant be all that bad now can it.
The kit is not built to be a chassis the strength of the kit is in the way its mounted to the running gear which is connected front and back through the ppf design of the mx5. ...
It was designed (by Stuart) to be put through the MSVA, though, which ought to be equally critical of such fundamentally bad engineering.Well considering the total sales of the exocet is getting on close to a thousand sold if not more (mine was number 200+ something when I bought mine in 2012) throughout the world including Australia which is tough to do It cant be all that bad now can it.
The kit is not built to be a chassis the strength of the kit is in the way its mounted to the running gear which is connected front and back through the ppf design of the mx5. ...
The Exocet's chassis is an abortion: it has negligible torsional bracing in the engine bay, and the Mazda PPF is designed as a simple brace to link the engine/gearbox in a fixed relationship to each other, not to contribute substantially to the structure as a whole (which is how MEV tries to use them).
Robin Hood sold many, many more than a thousand of their cars. All that tells you is that there are lots of people with as little money as they have engineering sensitivity, and who will therefore happily buy something because it is cheap, in blissful ignorance of the fact that it is also rubbish.
I'd be concerned that 80bhp would get boring quickly because overtakes will be very difficult so you're constantly stuck behind stuff that holds you up through corners.
Personally I think the perfect balance is something that just starts to get a little scary shortly before the rev limit. For me 140bhp is almost there but missing a little, 210bhp was too scary for me and 180bhp seemed the sweet spot. I couldn't afford the caterham equivalent so went the westfield route - but lets not start that debate!
Personally I think the perfect balance is something that just starts to get a little scary shortly before the rev limit. For me 140bhp is almost there but missing a little, 210bhp was too scary for me and 180bhp seemed the sweet spot. I couldn't afford the caterham equivalent so went the westfield route - but lets not start that debate!
EDLT said:
cptsideways said:
Could you build one to look like an original one?
The bodywork fits fairly closely to the chassis which is bigger than the original to accommodate larger engines and customers. I don't think you'd ever get the proportions right without chopping it up.Has anybody done a "Retro-Mod" my brother does it with bikes, with some rather cool results.
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